The art of screwing yourself, by Philips Benjamin

Ever try to be nice to someone else and end up shooting yourself in the foot ? Something of the sort happened to me this weekend. So i'm driving to school, minding my own business and following all the rules of the land (for a change). I'm about to turn into Erindale from Mississauga road, and stop behind this truck while I wait for him to turn. Inexplicably, the man starts reversing and ignoring all sounds emanating from me and my car horn, reverses straight into me causing some severe damage to the hood. The man doesn't realise he hit me so I have to do some chasing to catch up with him. Eventually I catch up with him. He admits to have reversed and seems genuinely sorry. I ask for his papers and apparently he didn't have any on him and he had to call someone to give me the necessary details. Alarm bells should have gone off right then and I should have called the cops. But i've been in situations like this before and felt that if he doesn't want to go through insurance he should be given a chance. He did seem kinda sorry and apologetic.

The next day however, the mechanic's quote came out to around $1400. The man goes nuts when he hears the figure and refuses to pay. On top of it, he point blank tells me on the phone that he's going to tell the insurance people that I hit him from behind. My insurance guys tell me that if he does make that claim, it could go 50-50 for lack of evidence and witnesses. What that means for me is a hike in insurance premiums for no fault of mine.

What doesn't make sense is, the guy didn't even have insurance for driving the truck. He had apparently given me a fake policy no. - 45678 (yes, in sequence)- and I was dumb enough not to catch that the first time. By not calling the cops on him, I saved him a lot of trouble, instead I get stuck in this mess!

Moral of the story ? Always call the cops. Get a written statement if you can.

Be smart, rather than nice. But be nice.